The intention is to introduce you to the people who have been carving their own path...with no care for what anybody thinks.

We try not to post things that are still for sale but sometimes post things that are not easily available. If you like what you hear, then find these people and tell them how great they are.

Better still, tell them and then seek out their new releases and buy them. We add links, when they are reliable and active, so that you can keep track if you so wish.

Always go straight to the artist or the label where possible. That way, the money goes straight to the people responsible for this art. These people rely on our support to keep going and make more quality releases!

Please feel free to leave comments as you go along...at least then we know you appreciate this stuff (or otherwise) and you're not just a bunch of freeloading file collectors.

If you made this music and we have pissed you off by posting any of this, please leave a comment in the post and the offending articles will be removed.

White-hot and affectingly lyrical double album by Kaoru Abe, one of the greatest free-jazz saxophone players who ever lived. The overwhelming intensity of his solo scorch is the precursor to artists like Borbetomagus, Tamio Shiraishi, Thomas Ankersmit, Masayoshi Urabe, and basically anyone who ever decided to pick up a saxophone and blow the living hell out of it. In the jazz world, he's in a class with Albert Ayler, Masayuki Takayanagi, and Peter Brotzmann, though his influence extends beyond jazz. The ghost of Abe's passionate shriek can be heard in the work of outsiders such as Hijokaidan, Otomo Yoshihide, Lethe, Keiji Haino, and Antoine Chessex, to name only a few. Unfortunately, Abe's tumultuous life ended too early; he died of drug overdose in 1978 when he was just 29 years old.

"Paritas" was recorded in 1973 and released after his death as a 2xLP in 1981. It's had a few 2xCD reissues over the years, all of which are currently out of print, scarce, and (as you might expect) pricey. I'm still not sure what about this is "unfinished". The liner notes are written in Japanese (a language which neither Mr. Inside nor I can read) and not much information is available online. If you can read Japanese and can help explain what about this is unfinished, please leave a comment here.

This 2xLP (and later, 2xCD) is one of the few Kaoru Abe albums to have been published during his lifetime. It contains solo sax improvisation recorded in October 1975, with one track of solo bass clarinet, in what appears to be a change in his style. Toned down from the full-bore chaotic note-flurry of his previous albums, "Mort a Credit" contains looser and more spacious music in a mostly high register, with bizarre shifts in microphone placement (though Abe might simply be moving towards and away from the stationary mic). There are long chasms of heavy silence, punctuated by machine-gun squeak. While it isn't generally regarded as his best recording (for those, listen to any of the posthumous live albums released by PSF and collected in a box set by Youth Inc.), "Mort a Credit" definitely makes clear the path from Abe to contemporary players Masayoshi Urabe and Tamio Shiraishi.

That bunny sure has an old computer. Maybe he's surprised that it still works. Oh wait, this album is from 1998! No laptops back then, kiddos.

"Performance Crippling..." is an unknown masterpiece of sci-fi ambience by Destin LeBlanc, one of the artists who ran the Zenflesh label in San Fransciso. It deserves to be dusted off, turned up loud, and allowed to permeate the air and seep into your pores.

Terrific time capsule compilation of underground experimental/ambient noise circa 1998, on a San Francisco label called Zenflesh. The label was run by Destin LeBlanc, who recorded as Turk Knifes Pope, and Jim Kaiser, who recorded improvised noise as Petit Mal. Both artists appear on this album, as does Randy Yau, The Bran (Another Plight of Medic's...) Pos, Instagon, some non-local artists like Flatline Construct, Noise/Girl, and Origami Replika, plus other artists who remain unknown to me and so are worth investigating for those of you who enjoy digging below the underground.

One side Kadef weirdness, the other a duo of improvised junk by Pille Wiebel with Recordings of the Summer label boss Michael "Dear Michael" Barthel. Cassette released by Kadef in 2006 in an edition of 30 copies.

I asked your friends what you wanted for Christmas, and they all told me the same thing: Kadef! So here you go. I hope you're surprised. This LP was released on Kommissar Hjuler's Der Schone-Hjuler-Memroial-Fond label in 2005. Only 30 copies were pressed, which probably more than covered actual demand. Kalojan Witanski, the mysterious artist behind Kadef, made a unique painting for each sleeve.

This is a lovely bit of harsh metal-junk noise with just enough subsumed plunderphonics to make this quite sinister ... the screamed vocals that come in make you think that things probably didn't turn out too well ...

I only know of three Knullkraft‎ releases. Unfortunately, this is the only one that I have ... that is a crying shame!

The further adventures of Santa Dog, again presented to members of The Residents' UWEB fan club as a mini-album, but this time the title character is... um... some kind of horror-movie creature, I think? It's hard to tell what exactly happened from 1972 to 1992, but mutation was definitely involved. Merry Christmas... ?

Jun Konagaya (later of Grim) and Tomo Kuwahara (later of Vasilisk) on a festive 7" on Jun's Eskimo Records in 1984. I posted their Holocaust 12" a while ago ... these two releases are all that White Hospital wrote unfortunately!

Given that Christmas is such a spiritually uplifting time ... I'd just like to take a moment to think of you all and hope that Santa drops something nice down your chimneys tonight!

By the way, Tusco/Embassy has continued the tradition and released a new Christmas tape every year. Two are available right as I type these words! v/a "Christmas Compilation 2012" is a 100-minute cassette featuring tracks by Aaron Dilloway, Skin Graft, and many other excellent Buckeye State noise folks, and amazingly, last year's "Christmas Tape 2011", a 90-minute tape with tracks by Tusco Terror, Leslie Keffer and more is still for sale. Support great artists and go buy these tapes!
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It's Christmas Eve, and so... commence the Christmas-themed blog posts! We shall begin with this one.

A live recording made at Aoyama Book Center HMV Shibuya on May 19, 2007. The artists make clear the fact that the title has nothing at all to do with St. Nick. The title has some other meaning, which I could read the text to find out, but I choose to ignore it. Mr. Inside and I have decorated our tree and goddammit it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas 'round here, so... This is a Christmas album! I'll believe whatever I want to! HO HO HO!

Jason on his own Cut label from 1999. He's a damn fine percussionist (and electonics experimentor and visual artist) who has worked with the likes of Günter Müller, Kevin Drumm, Kim Cascone, John Hudak, Steve Roden, Toshimaru Nakamura and many more.

Three sound walks by Canadian artist Janet Cardiff, taken from the CD that came inside her long OOP hardcover monograph published by P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center in 2002. The recordings are intended to be listened to on headphones... do it, and you will understand why!

VERY limited single-sided 7" lathe strapped to a piece of wood co-released on Bubutz Records and Tenzenmen in 2012.

Consider these Torturing Nurse‎ posts as early christmess presents. Just in case you don't have enough ammunition to get rid of the staggeringly drunk uncle / grandmother / friend / partner at this festive time.

Remember, this is a time for families ... but, c'mon, there's always a time when enough is enough!

This is Din a Testbild's debut 7" from 1979, one of the holy grails of first-wave German industrial punk. They existed in the same Berlin art/noise scene that spewed forth such lunatics as Einstuerzende Neubauten, Sprung aus den Wolken, Malairia!, and Die Todlische Doris. This single is regarded by true heads as the band's best. It's certainly the messiest and most raw, though I also enjoy the (much friendlier) follow-up LP, "Program 1".

The first 12" by Din a Testbild, produced by Klaus Schulze and released on Innovative Communications in 1980. Monotonous synthesizer tunes sans all the sharp edges that characterized their earlier work, but perfectly enjoyable if you pretend it's a different band.